Domestic violence against women: knowledge and attitudes of emergency nurses

Abstract

Background: domestic violence affects women’s health significantly and is considered a public crime in Portugal. The emergency room is a place where most victims go to and therefore nurses play an important role in identifying and redirecting these victims. Objective: identify knowledge, attitudes and barriers of emergency room nurses in the identification and redirection of women who are victims of domestic violence. Methodology: exploratory and descriptive study, in a non-probabilistic snowball sampling with 59 nurses. For data collection an online survey was undertaken. For data analysis IBM SPSS Statistic, version 25 and QDA Miner 4 Lite were used. Results: of the participants, 74.6% reported never having been trained in this area, but expressed interest in courses/training, as they consider that it is the responsibility of health professionals to identify and refer these cases. They identify as the main barriers the private nature of violence and the lack of action protocols in the services where they work. Conclusion: investing in this type of training for emergency room nurses should be mandatory as well as creating action protocols.